Twelve friends RSVP'd yes to my hen's, nine flaked on me that night

A Brisbane mum was left in tears when her entire bachelorette party was ruined by a bunch of ‘flakers’. 

“Four of my friends texted me that the pole dancing and stripper were too raunchy and they didn’t want to be involved in anything ‘immoral’,” the heartbroken Brisbane mum reveals. 

Four weeks before her wedding, *Felicity had planned to have the hen’s night she’d always hoped for. 

Her maid of honour, *Jessica, had organised for Felicity and her friends to have a “raunchy boudoir” photo shoot in a hotel room, go out to dinner and then take part in a studio pole dancing session where a male stripper would also be performing. 

“I gave Jessica a list of about 20 friends, and 12 of them had RSVP’d yes,” the Brisbane mum remembers of the occasion, eight years ago. 

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Image: Supplied

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The unexpected reason they flaked

On the day of the hen’s party, however, Jessica received not just one cancellation from a guest - but nine.  

“A few friends said they were tired from work, another is a paramedic and she got called in for a shift,” Felicity explains of that disappointing day.  

“Another four texted me that the pole dancing and stripper was too raunchy and they didn’t want to be involved in anything ‘immoral’. That was unexpected.

I was meant to be excited, but all day I got that sinking feeling in my gut as it went from 12 people to 10, then to five, then it feels like literally no one is coming.” 

Image: Supplied

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"I was trying to put on a brave face"

Felicity was left with just three loyal friends to spend her once-in-a-lifetime event with. 

“I was trying to put on a brave face for my friend who had organised everything,” the 32-year-old says. 

“I felt so bad for her.”

After she struggled through the pole dancing class, Felicity says she couldn’t help but completely crumble in the hotel room paid for by Jessica. 

“I felt so dejected by the end of it,” she says, still upset by the event years later. 

“We were supposed to go to a club after the pole dancing, but at 9.30 Jessica was so over it and went to bed and I was so miserable that I ended up drinking a bottle of champagne by myself, crying on the hotel room floor. I rang my fiancé at the time to tell him how terrible all my friends were and how glad I was to be marrying him because other humans were horrible.” 

The maid of honour was massively out of pocket

While Felicity was upset for herself, she was more concerned for her maid of honour, who had pre-paid for all of the night’s activities and was expecting those who had RSVP’d yes to contribute their share of $40 each on the night. 

“It ended up costing her a lot of money,” Felicity says. 

“I never found out how much. I felt so terrible.” 

Felicity even made attempts to organise a “more low-key” hen’s event two weeks later to make up for it. 

“The last one was an hour from where we all lived, so I suggested a night where we could gather at someone’s house and just do facials or something easy like that,” she says. 

“I thought if I offered something that was less effort for everyone, I could still get that hen’s experience that I was after. But nobody was interested in that either.”  

"This made me reassess the value they were bringing to my life"

While everyone managed to turn up for her wedding, Felicity still sadly looks back on that time with mixed feelings.  

“If I had my wedding over again, I probably wouldn’t have the same group of people there,” she says honestly. 

“The people I have in my life now are such beautiful people and it’s made me realise many of the friendships I had back then were not with good people.” 

Now happily married with a daughter, Felicity is friends with just two of the women invited to her hen’s party. 

“It was one of many things (catfights) that happened in my friendship group that made me reassess the value that they were bringing to my life,” she says. 

“They brought me negativity and pain.” 

"My expectations are lower now"

While she still bravely organises gatherings for friends and family, Felicity’s expectations after years of “flakers” are now much lower than they were back in her twenties. 

“Over the years, it’s tended to be a 50 per cent attendance rate, so I now just expect that if I invite 30 people to something, around 15 will show up and I just go with that, and not be disappointed.”

Originally published as Twelve friends RSVP'd yes to my hen's, nine flaked on me that night